Starry, starry night
by AliceAo
Summary: Even in the darkest of times, there is always a flicker of hope for love. Major feels going on. Beautifully melancholic if you want to feel the love


Starry, starry night. AliceA Summary:

Even in the darkest of times, there is always a flicker of hope for love.  
Major feels going on. Beautifully melancholy if you want to feel the love.

Notes:

Hey I'm back  
This one is quite sad, but it was a pleasure writing it.  
Thanks for all the love

Once again criticism is truly appreciated.  
Lots of love  
:D

Work Text:

The room was delectably dark and sombre. Muted moonlight danced across the floor in long stretching bands in pastel shades of grey. The windows were ajar and the heavy curtains swayed gently in the breeze. Every object in the room was cloaked in darkness save the few strands of light that bleached and distorted their once elegant shape. Sherlock was sitting in his seat surveying the empty room and admiring the majesty of the toneless room. A world without colour, like a movie from the 50s. He almost expected to her the crackle of film strips rippling along the circular bands of an old style movie projector in the back of his mind.

The room was still and his mind was calm. He rarely had these moments to himself, just him and his violin, sharing the night. He swivelled the chair 180 degrees and his features were flooded with the pearly light of the glistening moon. He stared through the window into the dark abyss of gas and flames, flecked with dark streaks of blue and emerald green. The music was slow from his fingertips keeping with the slowed beats of his pulse. Duh-duh… Duh-duh… Duh-duh.

Tonight the sky was not filled with balls of burning gases, but with diamonds, that sparkled so bright against the textured backdrop. The street below was dull with thankful vacancy and several streetlights had blown their bulbs mysteriously over the course of the last few days. Tonight was special. New constellations were emerging high above Sherlock and his violin.

"See that-" Sherlock whispered into the empty air while examining the constellations above the hum of the city scape, stroking the strings with his bow oh so gently, like a mother hushing a weary child into a deep slumber. "- that's Cassiopeia. She was an Ethiopian Queen who sacrificed her daughter to save her kingdom."

He looked down at the wooden instrument perched beneath his chin. "You'd never betray me."

He sighed and looked back into the sky at the dancing diamonds. "You'd never leave me. You'd never leave me to suffer."

His hands stopped and the room was filled with a thick overwhelming silence.

For the first time in his life, Sherlock stopped thinking and his mind was crystal clear.

He closed his eyes and simply listened, listened to the beating of his heart, to the sound of the blood pumping behind his ears. His mind was silent but his head was full of his own noise. It was soothing to hear the mechanics of his body still working after all this time. After the abuse he had subjected it to, the malnourishment, the exhaustion, the sheer pain of untreated wounds that were left to heal themselves, he was still sitting here in one piece, and he thanked the stars above him that he was. His body had gotten him through the hardest of times, times he didn't even know were hard, only on reflection. Times without his friends were the hardest and he thanked the Ethiopian Queen and her husband that he had people in his life he could call friends.

In the distance he could hear the sound of a door handle slowly turning and his body tensed slightly. His mind opened up the barricades of his mind palace and the liquid thoughts flowed freely back into his head, filling the space and drowning the stillness of the night sky.

"Time to face the music, dear" he spoke to the light wooden friend in his hand, before returning it to its velvet-lined confines.

The floorboards above him creaked with age. In asymmetric jolts the stairs noisily welcomed the shifting weight of the other occupant and his limp into the darkened room.

Sherlock didn't move, he just kept his gaze fixed on the sky, resisting the great urge building up inside him to break the tension with a sarcastic drone of insults. But he didn't. He just sat there, staring.

Each breath the men exhaled filled the room with a thick blanket of unanswered questions and argumentative slights.

The man behind him shifted his weight between his feet and he reached himself up to full height.

"It's been 60 minutes, Sherlock."

"58 minutes, John, your watch is fast."

John pulled his head to the side and pulled his forehead into deep groove and curves. He pursed his lips, holding in the harsh words that had been rolling around in his own racing mind for the last hour. He wished so much to expel the collected list of profanities that most adequately described the man before him, but he didn't. He just stood there, silent in the darkness.

"It has been more than enough time for your brain to mull over it," John said, trying to contain his frustration.

Sherlock's head dropped and he brought his hands up to his face and steepled them over his perfectly nibbed lips, like a sacred ritual only he knew the chant to.

A lengthy silence filled the room once more and Sherlock could feel the floorboards quiver with the shifting limbs of the anxious man behind him.

"For God's sake, Sherlock-" John spat out, coated with emotion. "-please just say something, ANYTHING at all will do!

The silence continued. And John's restlessness grew into sheer rage.

"At least have the decency to look at me, you arrogant git!" John knew the words were harsh, but they did not even begin to encapsulate the extent of irritation the man was projecting on him.

The silence was not broken.

John drew in a long, deep chested breath and held the oxygen inside, hoping it would cool him off.

"Please-" John begged, before his voice cracked and the wave of emotion seeped through him.

"-I can't do this, Sherlock, I can't. I just-" He combed his fingers roughly through his short hair and gripped his knuckles, all the self-restraint training he had experienced in the military was serving him no use in his civilian life. He looked down to the floor and back up to the ceiling, examining the light fixtures trying to keep his eyes dry.

The monologue continued, "-I'll leave, Sherlock, don't think I wouldn't! You knew this would happen but you didn't stop it. You could have told me you knew and saved me the heartb-"

But he stopped. He couldn't bring himself to say it. It had been eight months since the detective had miraculously risen from the grave and John had moved back into his old room.

"Would it have made any difference?" Sherlock finally spoke, breaking the tension his visibly distraught flatmate was enduring behind him.

John was startled by the words and his face hung in a long hollow state of dejection.

He said nothing.

"Would you knowing have made any difference, John!" Sherlock asked again, a bite in his voice that wasn't there before.

"What difference would you knowing that I knew all along make? Would it make you feel more secure? Would you feel like you had finally gotten the upper hand on me? I cannot compete with your wild emotions, John." Sherlock continued speaking into the dark sky, blinking back the moisture in his eyes. _I must be strong_.

John made small whimpering sounds as Sherlock's outburst and stray tears glided down his face.

"My emotions are not toys for you to play with." John whispered, sheepishly.

The silence continued for longer than either of them wished for but neither wanted to be the one to break it.

John's heart sank as he realised that this was it. This was to be the last conversation he would ever have with his flatmate, his friend, the man of his dreams. He was about to lose all of him in one go and the crazy life that followed him around, the late nights and the thrill of the chase. They were to be John's memories. And with that the tears started to flow freely. He didn't even bother to conceal the sobbing from the other man. What difference would it make now? He turned and made his way back towards the staircase, feeling the weight of his loss in both his feet. He had managed three stairs before he heard a sound from behind him. A foot, two feet on the floor, and the light tapping of soles against the carpeted floor.

"Would you be able to do the same?" Sherlock asked John from the centre of the room, his stance slightly widened and his head held high.

John stood on the step facing in the other direction and listened.

"Would you be able to answer your own question on the spot? Would you be able to reciprocate love on demand without at least thinking about if first? My mind may be superior in some areas, but I lack severely when it comes to emotions. You gave me one hour, one hour to think about what you told me. One hour isn't enough, one lifetime isn't enough to figure out how to love you." Sherlock finished speaking, his throat was dry and scratchy.

John heaved a deep breath from his lungs and shuddered uncontrollably.

"All you had to say was no!" And with that John continued up the stairs before feeling a firm grip on his thick wrist. John refused to turn around.

"Let go!" he barked at his flatmate trying desperately to collect himself.

"No-" Sherlock interrupted, "- you have it all wrong"

John huffed air from his mouth in almost laughter. _What's new there, _he thought to himself.

Sherlock tugged his arm and John turned to look at the darkened face of the man he loved so deeply.

"One lifetime, ten lifetimes, one thousand lifetimes would not be enough to figure out how to love you, John Hamish Watson. But loving you isn't enough is it."

The younger man loosened his grip but never removed it from his friend's wrist, as he felt the older man convulse with sobs.

"You great fool!" John smiled before he pulled Sherlock up to his level and captured his lips in his own. They wrapped their arms around each other and trapped their bodies together. They never moved, they simply stood and soaked in each other scent. The warmth of blood radiated off John's face and Sherlock brought his hands up to cradle the back of John's skull in his hands.

"P-please don't leave" Sherlock begged.

John smiled and spoke into Sherlock's pale cheek.

"I'm not going anywhere" and they returned to embrace each other's lips, savoring the taste and the joy that pulsed through their veins.

And for the second time tonight, Sherlock's mind was crystal clear.


End file.
